What Are The Dangers Of Smoking?

You may know that the steak you are buying in the grocery store contains fats that could cause your cholesterol to rise and your arteries to clog. But you aren’t likely to actually see a warning on that steak that says eating it can be hazardous to your health.

However, smokers in the United States have been reading about the dangers of smoking and health warnings on their cigarette packs for more than 40 years. In 1966, a “caution” that cigarettes were dangerous to your health was placed on packages. In 1970, the warning came straight from the Surgeon General that smoking could have serious health effects.

But smoking is more than just dangerous. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), one in five deaths every year is directly related to smoking. Smoking causes more deaths than HIV, murder, suicides and car accidents – combined!

And even though there are those who question the safety of electronic cigarettes, there are many doctors and researchers who feel that ecigarettes are a much safer choice for smokers than tobacco cigarettes.

This is what Michael Siegel, ‘a physician who specialized in preventive medicine and public health, and is now a professor in the Social and Behavioral Sciences Department, Boston University School of Public Health’ said in an interview with eCigaretteDirect.com:

“I can’t say how safe the electronic cigarette is, but what I can say is that it is substantially safer than the conventional cigarette. Inhaling nicotine cannot be nearly as dangerous as inhaling nicotine plus thousands of other chemicals, including more than 40 carcinogens. It doesn’t take long-term studies to make that determination.

As David Sweanor astutely pointed out, determining that a tobacco-free nicotine delivering product is safer than a product that delivers nicotine with thousands of tobacco smoke constituents is a fact of basic science, and anyone who challenges such a notion would probably benefit from a remedial course in basic sciences.”

Some Diseases That Have Been Linked To Smoking:

* Smoking And Lung Cancer: While most people automatically associate smoking with lung cancer, there is actually a variety of other cancers that have been linked to smoking as well. Kidney cancer, cancer of the esophagus, some female cancers such as cervical cancer and cancer of the uterus have been linked to cigarette smoking, as well as pancreatic cancer. Smoking is the cause of 90 percent of lung cancer deaths in men and 80 percent of lung cancer deaths in women, according to the CDC.

* Heart disease: Smoking causes the arteries to narrow and become restricted.

* Strokes: According to Eoin Redahan of The Stroke Association, “Most people don’t think about the risks of stroke from smoking, but it is a big problem. This should be a good incentive for people to try and quit smoking.”

* Aortic aneurysm: Emile R Mohler, III, MD, from UpToDateOnline.com states that: “In addition to age, a number of other factors may increase a person’s risk of developing an abdominal aortic aneurysm: Smoking markedly increases risk for AAA. The risk is directly related to number of years smoking and decreases in the years following smoking cessation.”

* Smoking and SIDS: Josef Buttigieg, lead author and a PhD graduate student in the department of Biology at McMaster University says. “When a baby is lying face down in bed, for example, it should sense a reduction in oxygen and move its head. But this arousal mechanism doesn’t work as it should in babies exposed to nicotine during pregnancy.”

Pregnant women have been warned about the dangers of smoking and advised not to smoke during their pregnancy because research has shown that smoking is a factor in low birth weight babies, and in some deaths related to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Women who smoke also have lower bone density than those who don’t, according to studies.

Even with the warnings about the risks of smoking, millions of people around the world still light up every day. The problem is they are not only affecting their own health, but the health of those around them. Second-hand smoke can lead to health problems in those who are around smokers on a regular basis. The American Cancer Society estimates that 46,000 deaths from heart disease in any given year can be directly related to second hand smoke.

If you or someone you know has tried to quit smoking cigarettes, but just can’t seem to stay away from this unhealthy addiction, there is hope. Many people are seeing some very promising results eliminating tar and other deadly chemicals contained in tobacco cigarettes and yet still satisfying their nicotine addiction through ‘vaping’ with the electronic smokeless cigarette.

The electronic cigarette (electric cigarette, ecigarettes, fake cigarettes, as they are also called) uses no tobacco, and therefore creates no smoke…..But, if you are still concerned about the ‘perceived’ dangers of vaping versus the proven dangers of smoking, do some research. Keep an open mind and ask yourself who has the most to lose or gain from the sale of these products. You can get all the exciting details on ecigarettes here!